The Forsaken Fidelius
by oihdsfx
Summary: Peter would die to protect James and Lily. But Lord Voldemort won't make the choice that easy for him.
1. Chapter 1

The Death Eater dropped Peter onto the ground like a sack of potatoes. Bound and blindfolded, Peter had no idea where he was. He didn't even know who had captured him - he'd been walking down a seemingly-empty alley on a minor Order mission when he was hit from behind.

"Ow," Peter whimpered, hoping to make himself sound more pathetic and helpless. He wriggled ineffectually against the ropes binding him. This too was an act. If Peter actually wanted to escape his bonds, he would transform into a rat later, when no one was paying him much attention. But making no attempt now would seem suspicious, so he continued to struggle futilely.

"Pettigrew," a high cold voice proclaimed, "what an unexpected guest."

Peter jumped, insofar as that was possible while lying trussed on the floor. _Shit, that's Voldemort! _

"Well done, my loyal servant," the voice added to the side, where Peter's captor presumably stood. _Addressing a powerful man as "servant" hardly inspires loyalty,_ Peter reflected. He had recently read a study that frequently addressing people by their names caused them to feel more positively toward you. _I suppose positive reinforcement isn't really Voldemort's style. Besides, they've effectively prevented me from learning any of the Death Eaters' names so far…_

Peter's musings on Death Eater loyalty were abruptly cut short as Voldemort began to speak again. "You may be wondering why we bothered bringing you here, instead of your more talented friends."

Peter hadn't been wondering. He assumed he'd simply been the easiest target. Lily and James were under the Fidelius charm; Remus was out of the country to negotiate with werewolves; Sirius was an auror and therefore equipped with many protective artifacts and tracking charms. Peter's work for the Order, by contrast, often required that he travel alone and incognito.

"You've always had a talent for secrets," Voldemort continued. "We have that much in common. But you see, my methods of finding out secrets will be rather _painful_ for you. You're a sensible boy; perhaps you'd rather skip to the part where you tell me what I want to know."

A wordless, instantaneous _crucio_ accompanied the word 'painful.' Peter didn't have to fake a scream, nor the tremor in his voice as he choked out, "what do you want to know?"

"The Potters. Where are they?"

Peter considered briefly before answering. The plan was to make everyone think Sirius was the secret keeper. There was no reason for it to be Peter - Peter the easy target, Peter the coward, Peter who was only James' third best friend - so it shouldn't be a hard lie to sell. If Peter _weren't_ the secret keeper, he wouldn't be able to answer Voldemort's question. He'd asked Sirius to try telling him where James and Lily lived, carefully observed his failed attempts to describe the address, and practiced until he could perfectly imitate the choking gasp that replaced "18 Woodland Street, Godric's Hollow" when anyone other than the Fidelius holder tried to say it.

But if Peter weren't the secret keeper, he still wouldn't reveal any information at the first question. He'd try to hold out, at least for a while, before telling them that only Sirius had the answers they were looking for._ Voldemort won't believe it if I seem to cave immediately._ So Peter clamped his lips firmly together and braced himself for torture.

"Very well," Voldemort chuckled coldly, "_Crucio._"

After two rounds of torture, Peter could no longer bring himself to endure more for the sake of selling his planned lie. He only hoped that Voldemort would believe he could be broken this easily into telling the truth.

"Aaaaaaaah, I don't, aaaaah, don't know, aaaaaaaaaaaaaaah please stop…" Peter trailed off, and Voldemort lifted the curse for long enough for him to speak. "They're under the Fidelius, I can't say, it won't let me, only Sirius can!"

Voldemort laughed again. "Do you think Lord Voldemort stupid? I checked Black first. I tortured him, extracted the name of the true secret keeper, and obliviated him. He betrayed your trust and he doesn't even remember. Do not lie to your Lord." A short _crucio_ followed the last admonition.

Peter could only hope that he was bluffing, and continued to protest that he was incapable of telling the location.

Voldemort was silent for a moment. Peter was still blindfolded, unable to see what he was doing, and found the silence more disconcerting than any threat. Finally, Voldemort spoke again.

"I shall have to change tactics. Servants, leave us."

Peter heard robes swishing, then a door closing. Finally, the blindfold vanished from his eyes, and his body was forcibly rolled into position to face Lord Voldemort's throne. The terrible creature of a man leaned forward, red eyes glowing and intently focused on Peter.

"Black may not have been able to give me the secret of the Potters' location, not even when I imperiused him," Voldemort whispered, "but there are flaws in the Fidelius charm. I cannot simply imperius _you_, because the charm prevents you from telling except by your own free will. Yet enough negative results can tell the same as a positive result. I forced your little friend to tell me that the Potters lived in every town in England, and when we reached Godric's Hollow he was unable to speak. Unfortunately I could not use the same method to narrow down the address; he was unable to describe any house in Godric's Hollow, as the charm apparently considers those close enough to be part of the secret. But Godric's Hollow… that may be enough information for me."

Peter's eyes widened involuntarily. Voldemort's tactic had been smart. But surely James and Lily were still safe. Even if Voldemort visited Godric's Hollow and walked over the entire town himself, he wouldn't be able to see the house, nor detect it by any magical means. That was the power of the Fidelius charm.

"Are you thinking that I need their house? Think again," Voldemort hissed. "I can summon Fiendfyre powerful enough to raze the entire village. I can cover the area with anti-disapparition and anti-portkey charms, block the floo, and ward against leaving the perimeter by foot. I may not be able to detect the Potters' home, but they will burn alive just the same. Every family in the village will burn."

Somewhere amidst the horror in Peter's mind, he observed a note of confusion. "Why do you need me, then? You could have killed them all as soon as you captured Sirius."

Voldemort smiled, if it could be called a smile with that horrible snakelike mouth. "You are smarter than I thought, Pettigrew, but you forget my goals. I wish to rule over Wizarding Britain. I do not wish to kill eight percent of its population. The Potter child is prophesied to be a threat to me, and I will kill that many witches and wizards if that is the only way to destroy the threat. But perhaps there is an easier way. You hold the secret, and if you tell me now, Godric's Hollow need not burn."

Peter gulped. On a rational level, Voldemort had made his decision easy: betray the Potters and let one family die, or stay silent and let a whole village die - including the Potters. If they would die either way, surely he had a duty to save the other witches and wizards in Godric's Hollow. Yet James and Lily had been his friends for ten long years, stood by him in everything, and betraying their trust was unthinkable. Their son Harry was an adorable one-year-old boy who had already wormed his way into Peter's heart, and giving him over to Voldemort would be abominable. How could he live with himself after that? He struggled with himself, fighting logic against emotion, for a long moment.

Voldemort seemed to sense what Peter was thinking. "This need not be a difficult decision for you, Pettigrew. Your friends can live. I need only kill the boy; if the Potters do not get in my way, I will not harm them. I will not harm you. I can obliviate you and put you back where my Death Eater found you, so that you do not even remember giving up the secret. If you wish, I can obliviate your friends too, so that they do not recall who had the secret in the first place."

Peter's brain immediately suggested all the flaws in this plan - even if they didn't remember who the secret keeper was, it would soon be obvious that he was the only one who could disclose the secret - but he supposed Voldemort didn't think he was that smart, and there was no reason to enlighten him. Regardless of who remembered what, regardless of the fact that Lily and James would hate him forever... there was a way to save his friends, and he had to take it. Harry was a loss, but he would be lost anyway if all of Godric's Hollow burned.

Peter nodded.

* * *

_J. K. Rowling owns Harry Potter. I don't own anything here. This is my first story and I would much appreciate (gentle) feedback!_

_This will either be a one-shot or continued depending on whether I get more ideas worth writing. If you have ideas, please suggest them in reviews!_


	2. Chapter 2

Peter had agreed, but declined to be obliviated. The idea of losing his memories bothered him on a gut level, and he wanted to remember why he had made his decision.

Voldemort would not release him immediately, of course. There was no point in having the Potters' address if Peter could simply run off and warn them to move locations. He had generously allowed that Peter could be kept comfortably in a warded room with a supply of books to read. When the deed was done, he would be released freely with his memories intact, and not targeted by Death Eaters for at least a month. (If Peter lied about the address, of course, there would be much less _generosity_ toward him, after Voldemort finished razing Godric's Hollow.)

"Swear it," Peter had said.

The Dark Lord had raised his wand and sworn on his magic that everything he had said in their conversation was true, and everything he had promised he intended to keep, and he did not expect his intentions to change.

Peter had turned this over in his head for a moment to check for loopholes, and decided that it was as good a deal as he was going to get. Taking a deep breath, he had opened his mouth and spoken, the words heavy with magic:

"The Potters live at 18 Woodland Street, Godric's Hollow."

* * *

Now, comfortably secured in the warded room with a supply of books, Peter was not reading. He had _Transfiguration in African Cultures_ open on his lap and was turning pages at a realistic rate, appearing preoccupied in the probable case that he was being watched, but his thoughts were in far too much turmoil to read.

Lily and James would never forgive him for sacrificing their son. Maybe they wouldn't kill him when he explained why he had done it, but they would certainly never treat him as a friend. Sirius and Remus, even if they understood Peter's reasons, would surely choose the Potters' friendship over his. The rest of the Marauders were far better at magic than Peter, but they were all ruled by their emotions rather than logic.

The rest of the Order wouldn't be terribly happy with him either. Most hadn't liked him much to begin with. And Harry could be the child of the prophecy, their promised savior from a decade of death and misery. There was still Neville, of course, and Peter would be sure to warn the Longbottoms that Voldemort had figured out how to exploit the Fidelius; but giving up half the chance of salvation was sure to be an unpopular move.

Losing all his friendships should have been nothing compared to the loss of Harry's life. _Typical human brain. Cares more about my own potential losses, even when others' lives are on the line._ Peter reflected on his own selfishness for a moment, and his sense of guilt deepened.

With an effort, Peter lifted himself out of his wallowing. He absentmindedly turned another page. Voldemort had claimed he would attack the Potters tonight, which meant there were still several hours for Peter to attempt to warn them. Ideally he could also escape himself, to avoid Voldemort's wrath… but if not, his own life in exchange for the life of the destined savior was a pretty damn good trade. _Of course, Voldemort only said he'd attack tonight after he swore that he'd been honest in our conversation, so it might have been a lie. Maybe he's attacking right now_.

At this realization, Peter had to restrain himself from jumping out of his chair. He needed to act quickly, but he was still almost certainly being watched. He'd been staring for several minutes at a map of magical population density in Zimbabwe, so he quickly flipped another page.

The first step was to obtain his backup wand without being noticed. Out of overconfidence or perhaps sheer laziness, the Death Eaters hadn't bothered scanning Peter for additional wands after they'd disarmed him. He kept his spare cedar and unicorn hair wand tucked into a small pocket in the back lining of his underwear, surrounded by a small battery-powered electric circuit to disrupt magical signals, but evidently this elaborate (and frankly uncomfortable) apparatus had been unnecessary. Peter reached back to scratch his behind, tucking the extra wand into his sleeve as he did so, desperately hoping his observers hadn't noticed anything.

_Step 1: done. Step 2: contact James,_ Peter thought. He flicked his wrist subtly in the motions to cast a disillusionment charm in the air next to him, effectively hiding a cubic decimeter of space. It took him four tries; wordless magic had never been his forté. Next, he tried to summon his patronus into the disillusioned space. This time it wasn't the wordless magic that held him up: his favorite memory, of James telling Peter that he trusted him like a brother and wanted him to be the secret keeper, had recently soured. He cast about for another happy memory, and settled on the day he had finally succeeded in turning into his Animagus form. At first he had been embarrassed to be a rat, and ashamed to realize he would still be useless at controlling a werewolf. But James and Sirius had been so genuinely happy for him, and Lupin had smiled a shy smile of quiet gratitude. He knew then that they would always include him, no matter how much weaker he was… and James had been quick to point out that a small form had its own advantages.

Peter couldn't see the Patronus inside its disillusioned cage, but he could feel its warmth when he succeeded. _Tell James to evacuate_, he instructed the Patronus, _and that Voldemort is coming for them._ There'd be time to explain more later.

He could feel that it wasn't working. His magic pushed up against another dimension as the Patronus attempted to go to James, but it failed as surely as if it were under an anti-apparition jinx. After a few seconds, Peter canceled the Patronus, ending the drain on his magic. _Well, I shouldn't have expected it to be that easy. Voldemort's prison would naturally be warded against the Order's communication methods._

Just to make sure, Peter attempted to disapparate, twisting his body under the pretense of stretching out his limbs. It failed, of course.

_Time to get creative._

* * *

Forty minutes later, Peter had tried every trick he could think of. He might not have been magically strong, but he was creative, and he'd repeatedly practiced the charms he'd thought would be most relevant for capture situations.

He'd levitated a small eraser and attempted to push it through the crack under the door, to test whether his Animagus form might be able to escape that way; but the crack under the door was warded against objects passing through. He'd then levitated it around the rest of the room, poking at every crevice that might be a potential egress, to no avail. He'd transfigured small explosives, silenced and disillusioned and shielded against from all but one side, and they'd failed to damage any of the walls. He'd tried to emit bursts of radio waves at various frequencies - none of his friends had bothered to learn Morse code, but _surely_ at least one of them would think to _look it up_ \- but they had all been blocked. He had gone through every other communication or escape tactic he could think of. _Maybe the Death Eaters aren't watching me after all. That would require some form of information leaving this room, which is looking increasingly impossible._

Well, as long as he was stuck here, Peter could at least try to gather intelligence on the enemy. Knowing who the Death Eaters were, what they were saying, or even where he was would be valuable tactical information. Unfortunately, the room seemed to be equally shielded against any information getting _in_, so his enhanced sensory spells learned nothing.

A scan of the books on the wall also revealed little information. _What was I expecting, the Malfoy Family Magic Manual? Or maybe the Death Eater Membership Book? _A surprising number of the books seemed to be about Albanian geography and history, but Peter had no idea what to make of that. _Maybe Voldemort is planning to buy a vacation home there. _He sniggered briefly at the thought of the Dark Lord on a Mediterranean beach, then sobered.

Night was falling, and he'd made no progress.

* * *

Hours later, Voldemort still hadn't returned. Peter had stopped pretending to read and was trying not to fall asleep. He wondered idly whether Voldemort would make good on his promise to free him with his life and memories intact, or whether there'd been a trick of wording in his magical oath. What had he even said, again? Peter wished his memory were better, not for the first time. There wasn't much point to being a spy for the Order if you couldn't remember the details of conversations you spied on.

The door slammed open, startling Peter to his feet. He dived to the side on pure instinct as a cruciatus curse crashed into his chair. Bellatrix burst in, looking even more deranged than usual.

"You sent him to his death," she screamed, "I'm going to _kill you!_"


	3. Chapter 3

Peter was not a talented duelist. His spells were rarely strong enough to penetrate his enemies' shields. He had poor reflexes. He was creative, but not a fast thinker. His typical reaction to a fight was to flee, earning him a reputation as a coward among Gryffindors. When he was under pressure his arms trembled, worsening his aim. In a fair fight against Bellatrix Black, the most feared of Death Eaters, he had no hope.

Peter went out of his way not to get into fair fights with Death Eaters.

Since he wasn't particularly good at developing spur-of-the-moment attack plans, Peter had already spent twenty minutes figuring out how he would escape if someone opened the door. He hadn't expected someone _quite_ this angry, of course. But when he'd been trying to reach James and Lily, he'd developed a plan of action in case someone came to check on him. Adding in the fact that Bellatrix believed he was unarmed, Peter had every reason to hope this would _not_ be a fair fight.

Step zero: make sure no other Death Eaters heard the fight, even if the soundproof wards on the room didn't apply when the door was open. Casting silencing charms during a fight was a waste of time, so Peter had done this beforehand.

Step one: distract or incapacitate Bellatrix. Invisible trip wires, invisible walls of spikes, flash grenades, more of the single-directional explosives he'd transfigured to besiege the walls earlier… there were many options, and they were all easy enough to _finite_ out of existence if someone came in whom he didn't wish to fight. Transfiguring and disillusioning objects during a fight was a waste of time, and probably downright impossible given how slow he was at complex transfigurations, so Peter had done this beforehand.

Step two: kill if possible. He grimaced at the thought. There was no question that Bellatrix deserved to die - that her death would save many more innocent lives - but murder still wasn't a pleasant prospect. Besides, Peter couldn't cast the killing curse, so he didn't have any attacks that would be likely to pass through a Death Eater's shields. If Bellatrix _didn't_ have shields up for some mysterious reason, his explosives should be fatal. Otherwise, he'd be better off running away than trying to finish off a superiorly shielded opponent. Peter could almost convince himself that not trying to kill Bellatrix was a rational strategy, rather than his subconscious mind flinching from the thought of murder.

Step three: hide. The disillusionment charm wasn't perfect, especially at Peter's skill level, and it wasn't too hard to shoot in the general direction of a disillusioned opponent when they were moving. But Bellatrix would be expecting a human-sized adversary, and might not notice a disillusioned rat scurrying away, especially while her vision recovered from the flash grenade.

* * *

So when Bellatrix swished her wand to cast a second cruciatus curse, Peter didn't need to think through his options. He wordlessly banished his prepared explosives at her. He stepped slightly sideways to put a disillusioned wall of spikes between himself and Bellatrix, and her next curse crashed into it, seeming to fizzle in midair. While she stumbled at the sudden barrage of explosions, he disillusioned himself, then transformed into his smaller form.

A near-invisible rat dashed through the still-open doorway and out into the hall. He had no idea where he was, so he glanced around quickly, noticing a grand staircase to the left. He could hear other Death Eaters in vaguely that direction, but moving down and toward the front of the house still seemed like his best bet for egress.

It was immediately obvious when Bellatrix left the room in pursuit. As she passed through his silencing barrier, her hateful shrieks returned in full, interspersed with curses. At first she fired dark spells down the hallway at random, but she seemed to realize fairly quickly that this wasn't working. She paused to perform an intricate wand motion, then snapped her wand like a whip across her body. Peter heard a whooshing sound overhead as the area-effect spell passed over him. A statue in front of him split with a _crack!_ and the top half toppled over in flames. If Peter had been at least three feet tall, he'd likely have been cut in two.

Bellatrix swore again, then shouted for help. "Get off your lazy asses and get Pettigrew!" She punctuated her demand with a stinging hex at the nearest Death Eater. Uncertain which way he'd gone, she recast the whip-spell down the hallway in the opposite direction. Then she began to chant. Peter didn't recognize the ritual she was casting, but if it was worth her time to chant, it must be proportionally worse than the curses she could whip off wordlessly. Adrenaline surged through Peter's tiny veins, propelling him down the stairs.

One of the Death Eaters did seem to recognize the spell. "Bella, stop, you'll destroy the manor!" bellowed Rabastan Lestrange's voice. He strode toward her, flicking a stunner in her direction and forcing her to abort the ritual. Peter took the opportunity to dart past him.

Bellatrix shrieked, unable to convert her rage into a verbal reply. She threw a volley of curses at Rabastan, which he dodged calmly. "Here's what I think of your precious _manor_!" she swished her wand twice then used it as a flamethrower, demolishing half the hallway and only narrowly missing Peter. "This is about _revenge_ for our _Lord!"_

"Bella, stop. Where did he go? How did he escape?"

"He, he exploded the room at me, and now he's invisible! I don't know!"

Rabastan rolled his eyes. "_Accio Pettigrew!" _

The _accio_ charm generated exactly the right amounts of vertical and horizontal momentum to pull an object toward Rabastan at about the speed of a tossed baseball. Peter felt the spell take hold, and his rat form went flying backward. Terrified of being caught by Rabastan, Peter figured he'd rather at least be able to cast spells to defend himself, so he transformed back to his human form. As his mass expanded a hundred times, conservation of momentum meant that his velocity slowed by an equal factor. He fell to the floor near where he'd transformed. _Well, that's a pretty awesome trick._ Rabastan wasn't looking in the right direction, so he didn't see the disillusioned form flying through the air, but he heard the thud where Peter landed. Frustrated with his failure, he tried again: "_Accio Pettigrew!" _

Peter didn't have a way to increase his mass a hundred fold again, but maybe the opposite trick would work? As soon as he felt the spell exert its force, he transformed again, and found himself flying over Rabastan's head at the speed of a bullet. He barely had the presence of mind to swap back to human form to slow himself down before splatting into the wall at the far end of the hallway._ It's a good thing these people have such an excessively large house. _

Peter smashed the glass of the nearest window and leapt out, landing hard and sprinting across the lawn before Rabastan could figure out how he'd teleported to the other end of the hallway. Twenty meters away from the house, he tried to disapparate, and breathed a sigh of relief when he felt his body escape into the crushing darkness.


	4. Chapter 4

Peter escaped one horror only to immediately face another.

He'd been thinking of James and Lily all night, so it was no surprise when his first instinct was to apparate to their home. Until recently, it had always been a safe location, protected by his Fidelius. Now, the Dark Mark shone above a house in ruins.

During his frantic escape, Peter hadn't had much time to process what Bellatrix was saying. But some part of his brain had dared to hope, when she spoke of revenge for her Lord, that somehow Lily and James had found a way to defeat Voldemort. Hope was not yet lost: the ruined house wasn't a good sign, but it could be the result of a messy battle which the Potters had ultimately won.

Peter walked forward, afraid of what he'd discover, but knowing he couldn't rest until he found out. After a moment's thought, he resumed his disillusioned rat form, in case anyone else had come to investigate the house. He crept through the empty doorframe where the front door had been blown off its hinges, and entered the living room.

James' lifeless body awaited him.

Peter froze. His mind refused to process what he was seeing. James was the leader of the Marauders, the best fighter among them. He couldn't be dead, or what were the rest of them? James was the one who'd seen potential in Peter, who'd taken him in and trusted him and taught him and called him brother.

Moving like an inferius, Peter pushed forward. There was no sign of Lily. _Maybe she lived_, Peter thought desperately. _She defeated Voldemort by herself and then she and Harry escaped. _

His hope was crushed once again when he entered the nursery. Lily's body splayed awkwardly at the base of the crib. He hadn't been nearly so close to her as he had been to James, but she'd always had a kind word for him, and she'd trusted him with her life. A trust he had betrayed earlier today.

Numbly, Peter transformed back into a human so he could look in the crib.

There was no sign of Harry.

Maybe the Dark Lord had taken him elsewhere to kill him, or to perform Dark rituals first. If so, why was Bellatrix so upset?

Maybe Lily and Voldemort had killed each other at the same time, and Harry had survived. Sirius would've come to take Harry somewhere safe. But then where was Voldemort's body?

Maybe Lily and James had won, and transfigured bodies to fake their own deaths. As soon as he thought of it, a desperate hope returned to Peter. But neither of them seemed the type to think of it, and if they had, surely they would've transfigured a dead body for Harry too. The hope faded as quickly as it had come.

Well, there was no point staying with the dead Potters in the wreckage of their home. There was no telling who might find him here; now that they were dead, the Fidelius charm ceased to hide the house. That was the _only_ way the Fidelius could be broken, in fact, which was why it was so rarely used. Even if the Secret Keeper died, the Secret persisted, and everyone who had been told it before became able to divulge it. _Wait. If the Secret Keeper died… they might notice that they were able to share the secret… they might have realized they weren't safe. There _was_ a way to communicate out of that room, I could have killed myself!_

Peter didn't know whether he would've actually done it. The chances of anyone noticing that the Secret was no longer locked to Peter were small. Even if they had noticed, they would only have known that Peter was dead, and not necessarily known that the Secret had been shared. Given that, it would have been very easy to rationalize continuing to live. At the same time, the potential gains had been enormous: a small probability of saving the life of the future savior of the wizarding world was probably worth Peter's death. Peter guiltily realized that he was glad he hadn't thought of it.

_If we were really smart, we would have set up a drill. Every couple hours they try to say their own address, and if they succeed, they know I'm dead, and flee to a backup house. Or maybe more than every couple hours. _Peter realized that he had never truly thought he might die. He had always _said_ he would die to save James and Lily, and he believed he really would have. He had never thought about it closely enough to make contingency plans for it, though, or to figure out how he could use it as a means of information transfer. _Next time, think these things through _before_ your friends die._

After saying a final mental goodbye to the Potters, Peter apparated away.

* * *

The first place he'd thought of was the Leaky Cauldron. Peter's apartment was too obvious. The Leaky Cauldron was also too obvious, but Peter was exhausted and didn't know where to go, and at least if Bellatrix came after him here there would be other people around who could help. Well, maybe that was wishful thinking… in Peter's experience, bystanders never actually did much to help anyone… but perhaps the presence of witnesses would deter Bellatrix.

After landing on the sidewalk out front, it took surprisingly much effort to drag himself into the pub. Peter's body was suddenly very aware that it was four in the morning, that he had been subjected to the cruciatus curse multiple times earlier in the day, that his arm was full of glass shards from the broken window, and that the adrenaline previously keeping him on his feet was wearing off.

Peter rang the doorbell to wake the innkeeper Tom. Apologizing profusely for the late hour, he offered to pay double for a room and some healing potions. Tom groggily accepted, passing him a pain relief draught and a poultice for his arm, and vanishing the glass with a quick _evanesco_. Peter also received a key for room 218.

Stumbling to his bed, Peter felt ready to pass out. He knew he should take the time to set up defenses in case the Death Eaters found him, but a few hours' sleep seemed infinitely more appealing.

Just as he began to drift off, Peter heard the faint pop of apparition outside his window. It was probably nothing, but on the other hand, who else was up at 4:15? His brain was on high alert. He knew he wouldn't be able to get back to sleep until he was sure he wasn't being pursued, so he sat up and considered his options.

A hearing-enhancement charm seemed like the easiest choice for quick reconnaissance. Peter winced as the snores of twenty other patrons assaulted his eardrums. Below them, he could hear Tom answering the door again.

"Can't a man get some sleep around here?" the innkeeper griped.

"Did someone else request a room here recently?" someone inquired smoothly. It sounded like Evan Rosier.

"None o' yer business."

There was a clink of coins. "Who was the other?"

Tom spat. "I'm not for sale."

There was a heavy silence, and Peter could only imagine a wand being drawn, a threat being implied. "Who was the other? Where is he?"

After a brief pause: "Pettigrew. Room 218."

Peter sighed. He didn't blame Tom - and wouldn't have wanted him to get hurt - but it was hard to find anyone you could rely on in these times. _He'd better at least give me a refund next time I see him._

Peter disapparated before the Death Eater could come after him. He should've left as soon as he heard pursuit; every moment he stayed was another moment when an anti-apparition jinx could have been put up. But he'd always had a weakness for listening in on conversations. He'd never been able to leave before the end, even if it meant he got caught more often. _If I want to survive with Death Eaters on my tail, I'm going to have to work on that._

Peter needed someone he could trust. He needed better plans. But first, he really needed some sleep. He resigned himself to spending the rest of the night in a gutter as an anonymous rat, where he was certain not to be bothered. And as for the morrow… he sent a quick note to Sirius:

_I need help. Meet me at ten o' clock, three streets south of my apartment. -Wormtail_


	5. Chapter 5

Peter woke with a start from his latest round of nightmares, and noticed that the sun was shining. _What time is it? Am I late for Sirius? _He glanced at his wrist, then realized his rat form wasn't wearing a watch. Scurrying to a private location, he transformed, and discovered that it was still only nine. That wasn't enough sleep, but he'd never really gotten the hang of sleeping as a rat, so it would have to do.

Peter stretched out his muscles. A day after being subjected to the cruciatus curse, they were stiff and achy. He hoped he wouldn't need to dodge any curses today.

He still had an hour before meeting with Sirius, so he apparated to Diagon Alley and bought a copy of the paper, hoping to learn what was going on. An unusual number of witches and wizards were around, whispering to each other in excited clusters. _Why are they all so happy?_ Peter thought resentfully. He knew that wasn't fair: they probably didn't know about James and Lily, and there was no law of the universe that said everyone had to be sad just because two of his best friends had died. He trudged to a bench well away from any of the excitable groups, and unfolded the _Daily Prophet_.

* * *

_**DARK LORD VANQUISHED! INFANT BOY SURVIVES KILLING CURSE!**_

_Last night, He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named paid a visit to the home of James and Lily Potter. It is believed that he cast the killing curse at their young son, Harry, when it rebounded and killed You-Know-Who instead. James and Lily perished in the attack, but Harry is alive and well._

_After more than a decade of fear, many are already celebrating last night's triumph. The ministry would like to remind all citizens of the importance of maintaining the Statute of Secrecy, even on happy days like this one._

_Our savior, now dubbed the Boy Who Lived, has been rescued from the ruins of his home by none other than Albus Dumbledore. Professor Dumbledore refused to say where Harry would be going, nor did he offer any theories on how a one-year-old child could defeat the greatest Dark Lord since Grindelwald. When pressed, he said only, "Harry will be raised safe and happy, away from any who might wish to seek revenge on him. I beg his fans to avoid inundating him with mail, since he cannot read it himself and I do not wish to impose more upon his caretakers."_

_Director Crouch of the Auror Office was unavailable for comment, but his assistants say he is no less vigilant in the aftermath of You-Know-Who's apparent demise. The Aurors will continue to track down Death Eaters and anyone else who uses violence to pursue the former Dark Lord's agendas. If anyone has information on how You-Know-Who was able to find the Potters, the Auror Office encourages them to come forward._

_For more discussion of how Harry might have survived, see the article on page 2 by the Prophet's resident charm expert, Monica Jacobs. For details on the planned memorial ceremony for the Potters, see page 4. For an exclusive interview with the Potters' next-door neighbors, the Gibsons, see page 5._

* * *

Peter's first thought was relief that Harry had survived, followed closely by happiness that the Dark Lord was gone. His next thought was that this article made no sense. The killing curse _rebounded off a one-year-old?!_ There were no shields that could deflect _avada kedavra_, and when it hit something it was absorbed, not reflected. There was no way that Harry, who was unremarkable _for an infant_, could have overcome it. _Maybe_ Lily could've come up with something, and cast it with her dying breath, but even that was unlikely, and wouldn't match the prophecy that either Harry or Neville would be the one to take down Voldemort.

So maybe, given the prophecy, it had been Harry after all? But prophecies didn't bestow amazing reality-defying powers unto people, they just predicted things that would already happen. The prophecy was evidence for the hypothesis that Harry was responsible, but it didn't provide a mechanism by which that hypothesis could possibly be true.

Peter reread the first paragraph of the article. It didn't supply any evidence for Voldemort's claimed death. Had there been a body? If so, it hadn't been there when Peter arrived, but then again, someone had already been there to get Harry. Besides, if the Dark Lord were going to fake his death for some reason - Peter wasn't sure why he would, but now that he'd thought of it, it seemed more plausible than Harry surviving a killing curse - he could easily manufacture a body.

For that matter, how could anyone ever be sure that _any_ Dark Lord was dead? Magic offered so many different ways to fake things that an intelligent and powerful wizard should have no trouble. _I suppose if they were Secret Keeper for a Fidelius charm, you'd know they were dead when other people could speak the secret,_ Peter thought with morbid humor. _Note to self: trick all evil wizards into Fidelius-ing something I don't care about and telling me the secret. _

Peter wondered how many other spells might have equally many unintended uses, if they'd ever come to his attention in a life-or-death situation. Sometime when he was less sleepy, he'd make a list.

Suddenly noticing that it was 9:56 already, Peter turned and apparated into a secluded spot near the street where he'd asked to meet Sirius.

* * *

Sirius, apparently, did not share Peter's respect for the Statute of Secrecy. He appeared in the middle of the street with a loud crack promptly at 10. Peter spun toward him at the sound, and hissed, "Padfoot, there are muggles around!"

Sirius bared his teeth. "Did you think I would care about witnesses?" He looked deranged. Peter could tell he'd been crying, and suspected he'd gotten no sleep. Sirius had always been a bit difficult to reason with, and his current state was unlikely to help.

Peter decided to appeal to his protective side. "Padfoot, listen, the Death Eaters are after me. We need to figure out somewhere safe to go without causing too much of a scene."

Sirius laughed cruelly. "Oh, the Death Eaters are looking for you, huh? Do they want to give you your reward for killing our friends?"

"I didn't kill them! I did my best to save everyone - you don't get it, Voldemort would have killed them all with Fiendfyre!"

"He DID kill them! He killed them and he knew where they were because you BETRAYED them!"

"You betrayed James and Lily first!" Peter shrieked out of desperation, hoping that Sirius would be surprised enough by this revelation to stop and listen. Unfortunately, it seemed to have the opposite effect.

"So that's your angle, huh, you little scum?" Sirius had lost his patience for talking, and started firing spells. They weren't stunners, either; Peter recognized a couple curses that were Black family magic, meant to kill their victim as painfully as possible. Sirius despised his family and hadn't used their magic in years. Peter had severely underestimated how angry he was.

Peter wasn't sure what to cast back. He couldn't produce a shield strong enough to block these spells, so his best bet was to incapacitate Sirius, ideally in a way that wouldn't hurt him and would leave him able to listen. His first thought was a laughing jinx - the Marauders had cast it hundreds of times, and it would leave Sirius unable to speak while also hopefully improving his mood. He fired a few of them while dodging Sirius's heavier spells, and eventually hit. Sirius started guffawing in the middle of the street, but unfortunately, he was a strong wordless caster. He didn't even bother to cast the countercurse, he just fired more curses as he laughed.

A blasting curse sailed directly at Peter. He threw himself to the side, and it sailed past him into a car, which promptly exploded. Peter didn't have any time to worry about the Muggles, because another curse was following in quick succession. He dodged the other way this time, thinking he'd made it, but a sharp pain in his fingertip indicated that he hadn't quite avoided the hex. Peter glanced at his hand, then did a double take, watching in horror as dark tendrils spread down from the fingertip.

This was really, really bad. Peter didn't know what the curse was, but he guessed at best it would permanently injure his hand, and at worst it would consume his entire body until he died screaming. He didn't have much time to deal with it; Sirius was casting spells as quickly as he could recharge the energy for them, and it wouldn't be long until one hit. Peter braced himself, and cast _diffindo_ at his own hand, severing the finger cleanly.

It was definitely time to run. Peter hadn't done a very good job with this conversation to start, and it had deteriorated fast. He could message Sirius later, when they both had gotten some sleep and time to grieve, and work things out remotely with considerably less risk. Peter still needed help, but he was evidently not going to get it from Padfoot. Dodging another hex, he ducked behind a car and transformed into a rat, hoping it was enough cover that no muggles would see. He spotted the nearest sewer and ran for it.

* * *

And that was where they found Sirius Black, laughing maniacally in the middle of a destroyed street, surrounded by a dozen dead Muggles and Pettigrew's severed finger.

* * *

_Thanks for all the lovely reviews! They are much appreciated. Yes, I saw that this fic has been posted on r/rational, and I encourage anyone who enjoys it to check out the other work there. I agree that being able to swear on your magic is broken; I didn't think that through enough before posting, and I don't intend to use it again in this story._

_This chapter was delayed because I was pretty busy at school, and also because Worth the Candle posted a huge update recently. :P I'll probably be faster in the future, but no guarantees._


	6. Chapter 6

Two hours later, Peter had finally finished magically cauterizing and bandaging his severed finger. With the pain significantly dulled, he turned his attention to next steps. He was currently slumped against a shelf in the back aisle of a deserted store, warded well enough to divert Muggles and alert him to the presence of wizards. It was a safe place to think, but not a safe place to stay long-term.

Who could he trust? He had thought that surely Sirius would help him; Sirius was the one who had always been there to take a curse for him and then give back as good as he got. He was also the only one alive who already knew what they'd done with the Fidelius. Peter could feel his heart pumping faster with anger and rejection and the pain of his disfigured hand. He took ten deep breaths, reminding himself that Sirius had had an emotionally fraught childhood and always reacted badly to loss. It wasn't quite enough to forgive his friend immediately, but he knew they would be able to reconcile things someday, once Sirius had grieved and then calmed down enough to listen.

Remus might or might not be more willing to hear him out. It didn't really matter; he was undercover with a werewolf clan, and any contact from the outside world risked exposing him. Even if he came back to London, he didn't have the resources to hide them both from Death Eaters; there was no Lupin family mansion to protect them with ancient wards.

His own family was out of the question. His mother had died of the same dragonpox epidemic that killed James' parents. His father was a muggle, and at Peter's urging, he had moved out of the country for the duration of the war and never told Peter where. Even if Peter could figure out how to contact him, it would only increase the chances that the Death Eaters would find him and try to forcibly extract Peter's whereabouts.

Dumbledore probably had the means to help him, but he was a busy man. Peter had gone to him in second year when certain Slytherins had been especially cruel with their bullying. Dumbledore had heard him out briefly and promised to meet with the bullies when he next had an open spot in his schedule. As far as Peter knew, the meeting might never have happened; the hexes and taunts certainly didn't stop, and Peter had learned to stay close to his friends when wandering the halls. Dumbledore probably had even more important items on his agenda now: various Death Eaters were being tried in the Wizengamot, and the Chief Warlock needed to ensure that justice was done. If Peter went to him, he'd most likely be offered a "safe house" with a few minutes' hasty warding, or else referred to a ministry office that would do the same.

That left the other Order members. The Weasleys were always kind, and Molly had offered Peter dinner more times than he could count. He always felt bad accepting charity from such a poor family, especially after they gave birth to a seventh hungry mouth, but perhaps he could make himself useful enough to justify staying with them. The Tonks were another option, but Andromeda was too close with Sirius. He would likely lean on her for support until he was ready to reconcile with Peter. The Longbottoms had the best-warded home of the bunch in their family manor. They'd been very close with both the Potters, and Peter flinched at the idea of trying to explain things to them, but they were both smart and reasonable people. Mrs. Figg was another one who had always been kind to Peter, likely because they were the two weakest members of the Order. She would have no ability to defend him, though, and her family had cast her out once they'd realized she was a Squib, so it was yet another impractical option.

Peter continued to search through Order members who might be able to help him, and when he finished, the Longbottoms seemed like the best option by far. As a bonus, staying with them would allow Peter to help keep an eye on the second possible child of the prophecy. It certainly seemed more likely at this point that Harry was the one destined to beat Voldemort (and possibly even had done so already), but with the Wizarding World's attention focused on him, there was more potential good to be done by supporting Neville just in case he was the true chosen one.

_I could train him_, Peter thought. _I have plenty of experience being the weaker one in a fight_, _and anyone who fights Voldemort will need to learn enough tricks to take down a stronger opponent. I could spy for him, help keep him safe… _Peter cut himself off. There would be plenty of time to brainstorm with Alice and Frank, if they accepted him. At this point he wasn't sure whether he would actually be helpful or whether he was just desperate to find a reason why his life was still valuable after he'd betrayed his best friends.

Peter let himself cry for a few minutes, hunched over on the cold tile floors of the darkened store, then dried his eyes and apparated to Longbottom Manor.

* * *

Peter knocked on the door, wincing as only three knuckles connected where there used to be four. _That'll take some getting used to._ There was no answer for a few moments. That didn't mean much; the Longbottoms were smart enough to take their time preparing a potential escape route and scrying to identify their visitors before answering the door.

Eventually, Frank poked his head out, a shield glimmering around it. "Peter? What are you doing here?"

Peter tossed him his wand (the backup one he'd been using, since the Death Eaters still had his real one) and held his hands up above his head. Frank cast a quick verification charm to make sure the wand really belonged to Peter, then cast a series of charms to make sure that Peter wasn't polyjuiced, or confunded, or carrying certain dark artifacts, or in possession of another wand, or being impersonated by a metamorphmagus. Once he was done, he pocketed Peter's wand and kept his own wand trained on Peter, in case he was imperiused (or there to harm them of his own volition).

(Peter had always really admired Frank and Alice. They thought things through, they didn't take pointless risks, and they'd only become more paranoid when they went through Auror training. They were as willing to sacrifice themselves for the cause as any Order member, but if there were ever a safer way to achieve the same goals, they were smart enough to find it. Even the order of the detection charms Frank had cast was carefully selected to minimize risk, prioritizing types of deception that were more dangerous first, weighted by their relative probabilities.)

((Peter realized he was still standing on the porch, thinking instead of answering the question.))

"I need help. The Death Eaters are after me. Sirius is after me too… I don't know if he's contacted you, but if so, please give me a chance to explain."

"Are the Death Eaters following you here?" Frank asked.

"No, I lost them a while ago. They'll probably check all the likely places I might be, though. Not sure if they'll think to look here." Peter answered honestly.

"Come on in, then. Alice went to send Neville off through the Floo when we heard knocking. Can I get you something to drink?"

"If you want to feed me veritaserum, you can just ask," Peter rolled his eyes. "My story's true, and we'll both be happier if you can trust me completely."

Frank laughed. "I'm glad you understand. It seemed a touch impolite. One drop, then?"

Peter nodded. Frank kept his wand trained on him until Alice returned, and then she took over while he went to prepare tea. Peter assumed Frank would mix in a tracer agent too: something magic could easily detect in the bloodstream, so they would know he had actually consumed the veritaserum instead of vanishing the liquid as it touched his lips.

While he gulped the cup down, Peter thought about where to begin. "It all started when Sirius suggested we make me the Secret Keeper…"


	7. Chapter 7

Frank and Alice listened quietly throughout the story. Alice gasped a few times, and Peter could only hope she was horrified at the situation rather than at him. It was only one drop of veritaserum, enough to keep him honest without forcing him to spill any secrets... but it made it hard to stop talking once he'd started, and he was a bit more brutally honest about the details of his choices than he had been even with himself. Any time he found himself rationalizing something, and _knew_ he was rationalizing it, he could no longer say it.

_Wow, that's really useful. Self-honesty is a hard skill. How did I never know that a single drop of veritaserum is enough to make me face it when I'm deceiving myself?!_

By the time he finished recounting his duel with Sirius, Alice looked a bit angry. But when she spoke, her voice was calm and understanding: "Peter, you know we don't blame you, right? You did the best you could in your situation, and either of us would have done the same thing. _Sirius_ probably would have done the same thing," - here Peter snorted, because he was confident that Sirius would have done something stupider, like attack the Dark Lord and get himself killed and then have the Potters die to Fiendfyre anyway - "well okay, maybe not, but he really couldn't have blamed you if he'd heard you out. I'm so sorry that he attacked without listening."

Frank's reaction was more practical. "Can we see your hand? We're not healers, but Alice knows enough diagnostic spells to check whether you stopped the curse from spreading."

Peter held out his hand, trying to suppress the wave of emotion at hearing Alice's support. _Why wasn't I closer with the Longbottoms before? They're such good people. _He felt a wave of resentment at Sirius for not being the one to support him, then shook his head, trying to push away that traitorous thought. He wasn't sure he deserved their sympathy, but given the veritaserum, at least he knew that he'd presented his story honestly and they'd made their own conclusions.

* * *

While Alice muttered charms over his fingers, Peter continued thinking about the veritaserum. "Do you two mind if I experiment a bit? I've never taken veritaserum before, and it's expensive enough that... I'd like to make the most of this." (He had started to say that it was expensive enough that he wouldn't get another chance, but some part of his brain argued that there were probably plenty of ways he could access veritaserum if he really needed to, and forced him to pause until he found a true phrasing.) The two nodded.

First, Peter tried thinking some obviously false statements. _The sky is green._ He could hear it in his own thought-speech as normal, but he couldn't say it aloud. "The sky is…" He could abort the statement, but he couldn't make himself finish it with "green."

_Hmm, even the aborted statement is technically a valid sentence. The sky exists, that's true. What if I tried to abort a sentence somewhere that left it false? _"'The sky is green' is a false statement." He'd tried to stop after "green," but he'd been compelled to keep going until he'd said something that wouldn't mislead the listener into believing something false. He _could_ stop after the word "false," so apparently he didn't need to say things that were grammatical.

Next, he tried some statements whose truth value he didn't know. "Five hundred thirteen times six hundred fifty two is…" He couldn't complete the sentence, so veritaserum wasn't injecting knowledge into his brain, nor would it let him finish with plausible-sounding answers like "three hundred twenty thousand, four hundred and sixteen."

Frank was watching with interest, and when Peter paused to think of more experiments, he suggested, "Try other languages, and nonsense languages, and statements in languages you don't know."

Peter knew a bit of Spanish, and apparently that was sufficient to block him from saying "el cielo es verde_._" On the other hand, he could easily say gibberish like "binka dudu vod rebleg," even though it was possible that meant something false in some language somewhere. Alice supplied two statements in French, one true and one false, without telling him which was which; Peter found that he couldn't repeat either.

"The first one was the true one," she revealed. "Can you say it now?"

Peter could.

"That's interesting," Alice smirked, "because I lied. The second one was the true one."

Peter could no longer say the first sentence, and he couldn't say the second one either. On reflection, he realized he didn't trust that Alice wasn't lying _this_ time.

_I wonder if I can create my own language that permutes the words of English to mean different things so I can say things in it under veritaserum. _Peter experimented with that for a while, but couldn't get it to work.

After about a half hour, the potion was noticeably wearing off, which is to say that Peter could lie again but only with enormous effort. They returned to the subject at hand, and Alice muttered a final diagnostic spell over his finger stump.

She frowned. "Your flesh is healthy, but it looks like a bit of the magic got into your bloodstream before you removed the finger. That's not the curse's usual attack vector, so your immune system might be able to clear it out naturally over time. It's circulated through your body now, so it's nothing we could solve by further amputation anyway."

"Should I go to St. Mungo's?"

Alice shook her head. "Dark families usually don't bother teaching their children curses whose cures are already known to hospitals. I think your best hope is to rest for a few days and see if it goes away."

"Would Sirius know how to cure it?" Peter wondered. He wasn't sure what he'd do if he did.

"Maybe," she said. "The Blacks would have wanted to make sure their own family members couldn't be hurt by the spells they invented, so they probably did develop a cure. I'll see if I can find a way to ask Sirius without letting him know you came here."

Peter nodded appreciatively.

"Relatedly," Frank resumed awkwardly, "I'm still not sure why you did come here."

Alice nudged him with her shoulder. "He needs a place to stay, obviously. If he can't rely on Sirius right now, who better than us?"

Peter nodded, embarrassed. "I'm not sure where else to go. I don't want to be an imposition, but I'd really appreciate a spot on your couch, at least until they put the Death Eaters in prison. I'd be happy to help out with the chores and such..."

Alice was looking at him with amusement, and he remembered too late that they lived in a mansion with a dozen spare bedrooms and a house elf.

Frank smiled. "Of course you can stay here, as long as you need. Our elf Tammy will get you set up in the master bedroom of the north wing."

"Thank you so much," Peter said with audible relief. "Any rules of the house I should know about?"

Frank exchanged a glance with Alice. "We haven't been going outside the wards much, except to visit warded friends' homes through the Floo. We'd appreciate it if you did the same, unless there's an emergency. We know you're a cautious person, but with Death Eaters after you… well, you can make your own decisions, but remember that if you get imperiused it'll put us at risk too," he finished awkwardly.

Peter nodded. "Believe me, I wasn't planning on leaving safety any time soon. I wouldn't want to endanger you two either."

"It might be better if you didn't even contact friends," Alice interjected. "Lay low, pretend to be dead. After that nasty curse Sirius sent at you, people would believe it. We don't know who might be a spy for the Death Eaters, but if they don't think you're alive, they won't come after you." She saw him hesitate. "At least until the situation has calmed down a bit and they've rounded up most of Voldemort's supporters. Of course you can reach out to Sirius once he's cooled off."

It made sense. Peter nodded agreement, resigning himself to cutting off contact with the outside world.

* * *

Peter woke late the next morning. The three of them had talked for a long time, discussing security precautions and plans for the future. They'd had a late supper, and then Peter had retired to catch up on sleep. Now, the sun was nearing its zenith, and Peter felt rested for the first time in the two days since his capture.

Peter showered, dressed, and ventured down to the dining room. Finding it empty, he called, "Tammy?"

Tammy appeared with a pop and bowed. "Masters Alice and Frank left the message that they had gone to visit Augusta. Can Tammy get you some breakfast?"

"Some eggs and pancakes, please?" Ever since Peter had been chased in his rat form by a dormmate's cat, he hadn't been able to eat animals; he remembered the feeling of being hunted too strongly. "Oh, also tea and a copy of the paper, if it's not too much trouble."

The breakfast was delicious, but when he saw the front page of the paper, he lost his appetite.

Sirius had been sentenced to prison for the deaths of Lily, James, and Peter himself.

* * *

Azkaban was the Dementors' fortress, and had stood strong for centuries on a barren rock in the middle of the North Sea. It was a place where most magic stopped working: at an approximately seventy meter distance around the island, spells fizzled in the air against an imperceptible barrier, transfigurations were returned to their previous forms, conjurations disappeared, and broomsticks fell to the ground. Any attempts to perform those magics inside the barrier would fail; wizards practically became muggles inside the fortress. Time travel and apparition were equally impossible. (For whatever reason, Peter had heard, you could still interact with magic in ways that affected _yourself_, as long as you didn't change your environment: you could drink potions or perform human transfigurations to increase your own survivability, but Azkaban remained constant around you. This exception made little sense even to the people studying it in the Department of Mysteries - surely the people were _part_ of the environment - and they were trying to find a patch for it, since it was one of the few security holes in the prison. In the meantime, they scanned people for potions at the border, and took away prisoners' wands.)

Right outside of the no-magic-zone, the Ministry had erected a huge spherical ward. No humans could pass through in the outward direction without being keyed into the system, a form of access they only granted to Aurors who brought prisoners in, and to the rare prisoners who survived to the end of their sentences. (When he heard this, Peter had immediately seen a problem with the word "humans." Unfortunately, Azkaban was in the middle of an ocean, and a lot of fish passed through the barrier underwater, which meant that barring all forms of life was a no-go.)

In summary, once prisoners entered Azkaban, they couldn't cast spells to blast their way out of their cells, unlock their doors, or fight off the dementors. If by some miracle they made it to the edge of the no-magic zone, they were faced with a ward, which couldn't be disrupted without using magic that was, again, blocked on the inside.

If that wasn't enough, prisoners rapidly deteriorated inside Azkaban. They lost much of their vitality and magical strength; within a week, very few had the power to cast anything wandlessly. They lost hope; within a month, even fewer could even think of escape. They lost sanity; if there were a strategy that could get out of Azkaban, its prisoners were not in good enough condition to find it.

Nobody had ever escaped.

Hovering invisibly on a broomstick a hundred meters outside of the ward, Peter couldn't help but think: _This is an incredibly bad idea._

* * *

The paper had explained that since Sirius Black was obviously guilty, and that since they had many other Death Eater trials to squeeze in, he would be sent straight to Azkaban without a trial in accordance with the Crouch Act of 1979. He would be taken to the prison that afternoon on the daily ferry trip to Azkaban, along with six other criminals and two auror guards.

Peter couldn't help but think that if Sirius was getting shipped to prison while actual Death Eaters got trials, the justice system must be in the pocket of a Death Eater - perhaps Abraxas Malfoy.

Peter had pondered how to get Sirius a trial anyway. He could come forward, discarding the safety of being presumed dead in favor of getting the truth out. Unfortunately, even if he did manage to secure a trial, it would probably be weeks before it was scheduled, and the same political factions that had evidently managed to get Sirius shipped to Azkaban without a trial might find him guilty despite the evidence. (A small part of Peter's brain pointed out that there was plenty of reason to find Sirius guilty _because of _the evidence; attempting to murder your friend with a dark curse was generally frowned upon in wizarding society.)

Regardless, Sirius couldn't wait for weeks. His family was prone to insanity, and Azkaban was notoriously bad for mental health. It would also permanently weaken his magical strength, and the Order needed fighters like Sirius to be at their best. Maybe these were all justifications, but the bottom line was that Peter could not let another friend suffer for his actions. _I'm going to save Sirius from Azkaban or die trying_.

Okay, that wasn't true. There were lots of non-fatal failure modes. But it had sounded more heroic, and Peter needed some motivation.

Peter had considered asking the Longbottoms for their help again. He would feel bad leaving the wards without their support, after the conversation they'd had last night. Plus they were stronger fighters than he was, and knowledgeable about Auror procedures. But they were also _loyal_ to the Aurors, and he didn't want to ask them to betray their colleagues on this mission. For that matter, there was no point having multiple people complicit in his planned crime.

So, no, it would be just him and Sirius. Peter was confident that Sirius would forgive him once he _rescued him from Azkaban _\- that would be pretty much the most awesome Marauder mission ever, and clear proof that he was willing to stick his neck out for his friends - and they would cure the curse in his bloodstream and maybe things could go back to having a semblance of normalcy.

* * *

Peter wasn't going to try anything so stupid as breaking Sirius out of Azkaban, of course. If the strongest dark wizards had never managed to escape the unbreachable fortress, then Peter had no chance. Instead, he had a plan to rescue Sirius from the ferry on the way to Azkaban.

He concentrated on transfiguring the small rock that he'd brought, expanding it until it looked like a sleeping Sirius. Then he levitated and disillusioned it. The ferried prisoners were kept asleep to minimize their chances to escape en route, so it should be a good decoy replacement for Sirius… at least until the ferry passed into Azkaban's domain and the transfiguration was canceled.

When the ferry came into sight, Peter angled his broomstick toward it. He recognized Auror Lee and Auror Smith standing guard, and flew high above them, descending just enough that he could identify Sirius among the unconscious prisoners. Travers, Mulciber, and Dolohov slumbered near him, along with three other Death Eaters that Peter couldn't identify. With a slow motion of his wand, the invisible decoy-Sirius lowered itself into position right next to the real Sirius. Now for the tricky part: he needed to distract the aurors long enough to disillusion the real Sirius and reveal the fake one, without looking like anything had changed.

Before Peter could think up a good distraction, one presented itself. There was a loud crack of apparition above them, followed closely by another crack. Bellatrix and Rodolphus dropped from the sky on Comet 220 broomsticks, screaming out curses as they flew. _Evidently I'm not the only one who thought of rescuing prisoners from the ferry; I'm merely the most subtle,_ Peter thought, closely followed by a string of mental swear words.

None of the curses were fatal, for once. Perhaps the Lestranges didn't have enough confidence in their aim from broomsticks to avoid hitting their sleeping comrades in the moving boat. Since the Crouch Act, the Aurors had no such restrictions: Auror Smith began firing _avada kedavras_ at the dodging brooms while Auror Lee spewed out nonverbal cutting hexes. As the Death Eaters focused fire on the one who could cast the killing curse, Peter tried to fly around to get a better shot at them. He twisted wildly in the air to dodge one of Lee's _diffindos_ that went wide. Recovering, he aimed a stunner at Bellatrix's back, but it bounced off her shields harmlessly, and she didn't even seem to notice. _Shit_. He glanced briefly back at the boat to see that Smith had been stunned (or maybe worse).

Next he levitated the invisible decoy-Sirius and slammed it into Bellatrix. She collided hard, and her broom spiraled down disorientedly. Auror Lee finally managed to get a cutting hex through her shields, just as he succumbed to another stunner from Rodolphus. Peter was impressed: even given that Bellatrix was distracted, piercing her shields would require powerful and precise spellcasting on Lee's part. Bellatrix began spurting blood as she continued her out-of-control descent. Rodolphus went after her, stabilizing and healing her, and giving Peter a few seconds of reprieve.

Peter considered his options quickly. He could disillusion Sirius and levitate him, and the two of them could make an escape. But Peter couldn't levitate a body at the same time as casting other spells, so he'd have to leave the rest behind. The Death Eaters would free their six comrades and kill the two Aurors on the boat. Peter shuddered at the thought of Dolohov walking free; he was a powerful enough duelist to have taken down both the Prewett brothers.

He could instead try to fight Bellatrix and Rodolphus - a fight he would almost surely lose, and one that could endanger Alice and Frank too if he were imperiused rather than simply killed.

Or he could cast a few _depulsos_, pushing the ferry the remaining fifty meters through the barrier to the waiting dementors. Lee and Smith would be safe there; Sirius and the six sleeping Death Eaters would be consigned to a life sentence in prison.

In the days following that moment, Peter would imagine a hundred creative solutions, ways he might have been able to save his friend without abandoning the rest of them. But in those few seconds he had to act, he only thought, _forgive me, Sirius_, as his banishing charms propelled the boat into the zone of no return around Azkaban.

* * *

_Thank you for all the reviews! They make me excited to post more._


End file.
